Day 72 of the Strait of Hormuz crisis opens with the diplomatic track materially escalated rather than resolved. On Sunday May 10 Iran delivered its long-awaited counter-proposal via Pakistani mediators — and within hours President Trump publicly rejected it on Truth Social. Two posts Sunday evening: first that Iran had been 'playing games for 47 years (DELAY, DELAY, DELAY!)'; then, after reading the formal text, 'I don't like it — TOTALLY UNACCEPTABLE!' The Iranian counter-proposal (per Tasnim, IRIB, Press TV, Al Jazeera, NPR cross-check) carries five core demands: end of war on all fronts including Lebanon within thirty days; lifting of the US naval blockade and OFAC sanctions on Iranian oil sales within a thirty-day window; Iranian sovereignty over and management of the Strait of Hormuz 'if certain commitments are undertaken by the US'; release of frozen Iranian assets; war reparations. The Wall Street Journal reported Iran offered to transfer some of its 60%-enriched uranium stockpile to a third country but rejected dismantling enrichment infrastructure; Tasnim disputed that framing. Mike Waltz on ABC This Week told viewers the US position remains a 'very clear red line' on Iran nuclear weapons but emphasised Trump is 'giving diplomacy every chance' before returning to hostilities. Energy Secretary Chris Wright separately said the administration may consider suspending the federal gasoline tax to ease pump-price pressure — first public cabinet hint that domestic political cost is being modelled.
Markets rose in CNBC May 11 intraday print: Brent at approximately $103.93/bbl (+2.6% from Friday $101.29 settle); WTI ~$97.88 (+2.6% from $95.42). This is a multi-source confirmation print — earlier Asian-trade single-source reporting of ~$105.85 has consolidated lower as London and New York opens factored in. Direction is unambiguous: deal-optionality unwound, though the magnitude is more moderate than the Asian-trade tape suggested. Both benchmarks sit in the GEF Elevated band middle range. Phillip Nova analyst Sachdeva characterised the market as a 'geopolitical headline machine.' JPMorgan's Bruce Kasman framed elevated energy prices as 'headwinds rather than expansion-ending obstacles.' Adding to the bearish-for-peace stack, Prime Minister Netanyahu told CBS 60 Minutes (aired Sunday) the war is 'not over,' with 'more work to be done' on enriched uranium removal, enrichment dismantlement, proxies and ballistic missiles; he stated a diplomatic outcome remains his preference but explicitly did not rule out continued force. The Israeli posture is broader than just the Iran nuclear file.
The partial offset to all of this came at sea Sunday. The Qatari LNG carrier Al Kharaitiyat (IMO 9397327, Marshall Islands-flagged, Nakilat-owned, 211,986 m³ capacity) completed Hormuz transit via the Tehran-approved northern route hugging the Iranian coast at Qeshm and Larak islands, exiting into the Gulf of Oman Sunday evening en route to Pakistan's Port Qasim. Multi-source confirmation from Kpler, MarineTraffic, LSEG and Bloomberg. Reuters and Bloomberg both characterise this as a government-to-government Pakistan-Qatar deal with Iran approving passage as a confidence-building measure for the two mediator states; Bloomberg adds that Pakistan is in talks with Iran for a 'limited number' of additional Qatari LNG cargoes. Two earlier Qatari attempts (Rasheeda, Al Daayen) were aborted on April 6. This is the first Qatari LNG to exit Hormuz since the war began on February 28, and demonstrates that Tehran retains discretionary control over who transits — a substantive sovereignty-of-transit assertion ahead of nuclear talks, not a Hormuz reopening signal. Two ADNOC LNG cargoes have also reportedly transited recently per Bloomberg background, but Gulf-wide LNG flows remain far below the pre-war ~3 cargoes/day rate.
On parallel theatres: Russia-Ukraine three-day ceasefire (May 9-10-11) expires midnight tonight with mutual breach accusations. Russian MoD claims 1,000+ Ukrainian violations over the weekend; Zelensky on Sunday said Russia is 'neither observing the truce nor even particularly trying to' — one civilian killed and several injured in Russian drone/artillery strikes in the last 24 hours; 150 combat engagements on the front line; Ukraine refrained from long-range strikes Sat-Sun in the absence of large-scale Russian attacks. Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov was explicit Friday that the ceasefire is for three days, 'not longer.' Putin post-Victory Day said the conflict 'is coming to an end' and offered direct talks with Zelensky in Moscow or a neutral venue, but only after terms are pre-agreed; Peskov dismissed extension talk as 'complex.' Base case: ceasefire lapses tonight; Ukrainian refinery-strike campaign resumes mid-week. Trump's state visit to China is now confirmed for May 13-15 (PRC MFA announced May 11 Beijing time): arrival Wednesday evening, opening ceremony Thursday, departure Friday; Boeing and Mastercard CEOs plus agricultural executives in the delegation; Eric and Lara Trump accompanying in personal capacity. White House officials confirmed Iran and Hormuz are on the agenda — Trump expected to press Xi on Chinese purchases of Iranian crude. Brookings/CSIS frame the summit as 'stabilisation, not breakthrough,' with Taiwan, rare earths, AI, and North Korea also on the agenda. The visit either anchors a deal or defers everything by two to four weeks.
On fuel shortages and supply: HK Express's 6% capacity cut went live today May 11 through June 30 as scheduled (multi-source confirmation from Cathay press, CNBC, AeroTime, TTG Asia, VisaHQ; no pre-launch revisions) — promoting that watch-list entry to active disruption and taking the GEF confirmed count to thirteen with two remaining in watch. Lufthansa Group published its June schedule revision May 2 (AeroRoutes / eXperts Irreg): ten routes consolidated via alternate hubs, Frankfurt-Stuttgart discontinued from June (replaced by Lufthansa Express Rail plus larger STR-MUC aircraft), Frankfurt-Newcastle and Frankfurt-Katowice discontinued, CityLine permanently shut. UK Day +7 past the May 4 cliff edge still shows no NOTAM, no visible rationing; GOV.UK position holds — 'UK airlines are clear that they are not currently seeing a shortage of jet fuel' — and Cirium data shows 0.53% of planned May UK flights cancelled, ~1,200 UK departures cancelled May 3-Jun 14 within normal range. Goldman Sachs's May 6 note (UK at greatest risk for jet-fuel rationing this summer; European commercial jet inventories projected below the IEA 23-day threshold in June, <20 in July, <15 in August) remains the credible tail scenario but is not yet visible in operational data. Russian crude runs remain at 4.69 mb/d (16-year low) after the Kirishi/KINEF (May 5, 3 of 4 CDUs damaged) and Yaroslavl/Slavneft-YANOS (overnight May 8, large fire) strikes. Tuapse remains suspended indefinitely; CPC Novorossiysk running at ~65% capacity; ADCOP/Fujairah damage assessment ongoing post-May 4-5 strikes. Slovenia Day 50; Hungary Day 64; Druzhba north Day 11 of halt to PCK Schwedt (260kt May Kazakh volumes redirected); Spirit Airlines Day 10 of wind-down. EU gas storage updated to 35.05% / ~397 TWh per GIE AGSI+ May 10 06:00 CEST — crossing into the rule-book LOW band per the GEF threshold framework (May seasonal bands: low ≥35%, moderate ≥28%). This is a band label, not a clean bill of health: at 35.05% the system remains approximately 20pp below the 5-year May 10 norm of ~55% per EnergyRiskIQ, and the injection pace concern persists at ~2,088 GWh/day vs ~3,462 GWh/day required for the 90% Nov 1 target.